Falcon vs Bison: Verifying a MiG-21 Wreck

On February 27th amid heightening tensions between India and Pakistan in Kashmir, an Indian Air Force MiG-21 aircraft was shot down by Pakistan. In the ensuing war of words over the incidents, both sides made varying claims about the incident, with India saying they had downed a Pakistani aircraft, while Pakistan stated it had downed two Indian aircraft. India acknowledged the loss of one, while Pakistan denied any losses of aircraft.

Against this backdrop, when images of apparent aircraft wreckage started popping up on social media, different interpretations were offered on what the images actually show. This post focuses on claims that pictures released by Pakistan actually showed parts of an F-16, purportedly downed by India.

The two tweets below are examples of claims made regarding the aircraft pieces.

The tweets above claimed to show F-16 parts, so we’re focusing on these for the verification. First, comparing two of the images released by Pakistan, we can determine they are two different perspectives of the same aircraft part. The colored arrows point out details that can be used for matching, such as a service hatch and a bent metal pipe.

A YouTube video from the scene also presents a walkaround view of the same part, establishing the same. (1:56 onwards)

If we rotate the image 180 degrees and put it side-by-side with a MiG-21’s tail, we have a good match.

For completeness, we can also match the section with the box which was claimed to contain an F-16 serial to this same piece.

According to a MiG-21 service manual available through CIA’s archive, we can determine that this is the thermocouple service hatch. Another manual for the aircraft states that the thermocouple junction box is located in this part of the aircraft, so it’s possible that is the function of the numbered box.

So, taken together, this is all so say that the claim about the writing on the junction box proving this is be an F-16 part is not correct. This is in fact very much part of an Indian MiG-21.

But what about the other fragment that was matched to an F-16, suggesting it was part of the engine? We don’t have a good match to an F-16 there, either. On the left below, we see an F-16 GE F110 engine being removed from the aircraft. (U.S. Air Force photo) On the right, a close up of the fragment from Pakistan. Note the uniform rectangular distribution on the F-16 engine cover, while the piece in Pakistan in showing different patterns and thicknesses of supports on the piece, while also curving inward.

In summary, there’s no compelling evidence offered as of yet that an F-16 would have been shot down, and all signs point to MiG-21 wreckage having been on display thus far.

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Veli-Pekka is a doctoral student at Finnish National Defence University, researching social media and open source intelligence. He has a long background in the technology industry, more recently focusing on defense research.

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Hi Veli-Pekka, i am quite impressed from your analysis. Extremely detailed and well documented impressive work. Here is another task for you. Please look at this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0boJTxWKcOQ and if you can give your opinion of whether this being the tail of the 2nd MIG21 shot down by Pakistan?

So this is your conclusive report so basically you found it easier to find the MIG wreckage since india accepted it so it was basically a easier research report for you write. Now if you did care to go deep in research and found a conclusive evidence on F-16 that woulld be appreciated half effort not really needs any applauds.

The thing is that Indians never denied that they suffered casualties, unlike pakistanis. The whole world knows that pakistan is a habitual liar and they live in denail believing in some sort of islamic utopia. At the worst, the indian media may be a bit over-dramatic sometimes and a little pathetic, but the Indian military is definitely not. Just take a look at the pakistani military history. They even fucked up in the UN missions.

Not platform is left untouched by Indians using pseudonames for Pakistan bashing , though in current scenario it’s India us lying, they had to accept they lost one aircraft because their pilot was caught alive otherwise it would have been different story

Pak did claim 2 ‘hits’ and two pilots in custody, one alive and the other hospitalised in an indeterminate condition. This came in an early army official briefing. Later, the account was changed to only one pilot captured. Anyway, what about the hospitalised pilot? If he wasn’t Indian he probably was Pakistani.

The language spoken in this video (which seems to show crew before the first search and rescue teams have reached the crash sight). The language spoken is Marathi (with a very rural accent) which is the local Language in the state of Maharashtra, and not Kashmir expected to be used if the video was from where and when it is claimed to be.

Pakistan said they have 2 Indian pilots in their custody, one was found injured.
The one who was injured was a Pakistani Soldier.
Pakistan also claimed that they shot down 2 Indian aircrafts.
Later everyone got to know that one Indiam soldier returned back and was safe but one was in their custody.
NOW TELL ME, IF IT WASN’T PAKISTANI AIRCRAFT THEN WHO’S?
AND DO EXPLAIN ME HOW CAN WE FIT 2 PILOTS INSIDE A SINGLE MIG 21 BISON.

Lol, it was just an Indian cite who claimed, do you really think that pentagon cears about Indian claims or pakistani claims? Foreign Policy is the most well credible and open neutral source and usually US cite so i don’t know the same india was saying US to investigate and now again doing the same propaganda? why?

Reply to Lal “US has confirmed no F-16 has been shot down”
Reply to Ralph Smith “Pentagon said on Friday it was “not aware” of any audit of Pakistan’s F-16”

Lie – US DOD never released any statement regarding F-16 claimed by Indian newspapers on Friday 05 April, 2019. Moreover, DOD never even had any press briefing held on April 05 – https://dod.defense.gov/News/Transcripts/

The India AOC western command would not have been sacked if IAF had shot down a Pakistani F-16. The video playing of real time would have conclusively proved. None of that, other than childish evidence of two static radar images. No satellite images either. No confirmation from Lockheed – whose rep is at all the time in Paksitan- and no confirmation from Pentagon. It is all cock and bull story from a humiliated IAF – a chopper down, Mig-21 down, SU-30 shot down- to cover its face. Second pilot story in no way proves any F-16 downing claim, other than in Indian imagination. Why would Pakistani PM mention the second pilot being downed if Pakistan wanted to hide its F-16? Makes no sense. The second pilot is an Israeli weapons officer flying in the backseat of SU-30. Due to explosive international dimensions of the issue, Pakistan is refraining from mentioning it.

replying to hammad said, you said a su 30 mki was shot down as well, then lol friend, no media, not even pakistani aur international media stated any su 30 mki shot down in action so from where did you get such a fake news. when your f16s crossed the loc 2 mig 21 were scrambled to intercept as well as 2 su 30 mki and 1 mirage 2000, but the migs were the 1st to respond and so there was a dogfight in which one mig 21 was shot down as well as a f 16, both on the pakistani side, now the remaining mig returned to its airbase as well as the the remaining f16s returned back and while returning they fired 3 missiles on su 30 mki’s which were all dodged off. out of the 3 aim 120s 1 was recovered which was later displayed by IAF. Now talking about the downed f16, of course PAF will try to hide its embarrassment for its loss, as well as had the news of loss of f 16 came out, the PAF would have broke the rules of sale of f16 which clearly stated that f16’s sold to pakistan cannot be used for offensive purposes. now talking about the satellite images, then my dear friend you also no that no satellite was able to locate any f 16 crash beacuse the pakistan army had enough time to hide the proof of crash before the news came out. talking about the counting by the officials it is no new thing no know that pakistan government is one of the most corrupted government in the world so you can some up the rest. thank you

Reply to pranav
U talk about this aerial warfare scenario as if u yourself where conducting this Air battle. How do u know these events took place like this? Where u the pilot who was flying the MiG-21, or where u the radar controller monitoring this fight?? Your information is all based on hearsay just like all Indian information. Yes I agree Pakistan is just claiming a SU-30 shot but in reality they have no proof. This claim is no different then the Indian claim of a down F-16. Your claim is just words and no proof. You r just giving a hypothetical scenario of how u downed a F-16 and how Pakistan hid a whole wreckage and and its pilot. Have u seen the wreckage, have u seen its Pilot? U have absolutely no evidence but just claims made on the bases of hearsay. The only evidence we have in this whole scenario is a downed MiG-21 and its captured pilot. Rest r all bogus claims with no actual evidence